El Camino Real Charter High School at risk of losing charter status

El Camino Real Charter High School is at risk of losing its charter status after a review by the Los Angeles Unified School District indicated a wide range of problems, including alleged inappropriate spending. (KABC)

El Camino Real Charter High School is at risk of losing its charter status after a review by the Los Angeles Unified School District indicated a wide range of problems, including alleged inappropriate spending.

The high school is in its sixth year of charter status, which means it is an independent school outside the purview of LAUSD. However, the district still has oversight of the school.

This week, LAUSD took its first steps to possibly revoking the school's charter.

"I think it is frustrating. I think we thought we were complying the whole entire time," said Marshall Mayotte, the school's chief business officer.

This was all set into motion nearly a year ago in October 2015, when the school was issued two notices - one of which was over school administrators' personal use of a school credit card.

"We hired additional people to do additional oversight. So I think for us, we eliminated the credit cards. Again, we thought we were doing everything we could, and it just didn't seem to make them happy," Mayotte said.

In a statement, the school said the aforementioned credit card purchases did not occur. The statement also read, in part:

"ECRCHS is witnessing first-hand the extreme measures a school district will take to wrestle back control of a successful charter school. There's no debating the popularity of charter schools within LAUSD and the desire to further expand innovation and parent choice in public education arena. As LAUSD revenues continue to decline, the District has become more hostile towards charter schools."

The statement goes on to call LAUSD's allegations "arbitrary and specious."

The next step is a meeting next Tuesday, when the Board of Education will consider beginning the process of revoking the school's charter, something many parents don't want to see happen.